The Forrester Wave Socia

For B2C Marketing Professionals
The Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management

Solutions, Q2 2017
The 10 Leading Vendors Supporting Enterprise Social Marketing
by Erna Alfred Liousas and Jessica Liu

June 12, 2017
Why Read This Report Key Takeaways

In our 32-criteria evaluation of social media Hootsuite, Lithium Technologies, Spredfast,
management solution providers, we identified the And Sprinklr Lead The Pack
10 most significant ones — Facelift, Hootsuite, Forrester’s research uncovered a market in which
Lithium Technologies, Oracle, Percolate, Hootsuite, Lithium, Spredfast, and Sprinklr lead
Salesforce, Spredfast, Sprinklr, Sprout Social, the pack. Facelift, Sysomos, Percolate, and
and Sysomos — and researched, analyzed, Salesforce offer competitive options. Oracle and
and scored them. This report shows how each Sprout Social lag.
provider measures up and helps B2C marketers
Recent Solution Updates Fuel Enterprisewide
make the right choice.
Collaboration
As social media usage permeates the enterprise,
social media management solutions (SMMS)
follow suit. Most providers deliver enhanced
review and approval and response management
capabilities, responding to organizationwide
needs. However, social advertising capabilities
remain an opportunity area.
Measurement, Integration, And Security

Certifications Are Key Differentiators
As SMMS technology becomes more
commoditized, SMMS providers prioritizing digital
enterprisewide capabilities will prevail. Such
capabilities include: measurement that validates
business impact, integration within the client’s
existing technology stack, and international
security certification.
forrester.com
For B2C Marketing Professionals
The Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management Solutions,

Q2 2017
by Erna Alfred Liousas and Jessica Liu

with Brigitte Majewski, Stephanie Liu, and Christine Turley
June 12, 2017
Table Of Contents Related Research Documents

2 Brands’ Demands For SMMS Mature, Build Customer Relationships With Social
Expanding Use Cases Customer Care
SMMS Technology Responds To Brands’ How To Measure Social Programs

Expanded Social Needs, Albeit Gradually
Vendor Landscape: Social Marketing Technology
4 Overlap With Digital Marketing Tools Raises
The Bar For SMMS Vendors
5 Social Media Management Solution

Evaluation Overview
Evaluated Vendors And Inclusion Criteria
7 Vendor Profiles
Leaders
Strong Performers
Contenders
12 Supplemental Material
Forrester Research, Inc., 60 Acorn Park Drive, Cambridge, MA 02140 USA

+1 617-613-6000 | Fax: +1 617-613-5000 | forrester.com
© 2017 Forrester Research, Inc. Opinions reflect judgment at the time and are subject to change. Forrester®,
Technographics®, Forrester Wave, TechRadar, and Total Economic Impact are trademarks of Forrester Research,
Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective companies. Unauthorized copying or distributing
is a violation of copyright law. Citations@forrester.com or +1 866-367-7378
For B2C Marketing Professionals June 12, 2017
The Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management Solutions, Q2 2017
Brands’ Demands For SMMS Mature, Expanding Use Cases

Since our 2015 Forrester Wave™ on social relationship platforms (SRPs), enterprises have matured in
their use of social media. Marketers actively embrace it, as do other business units such as customer
service, product, sales, and HR.1 Because of this expansion, Forrester now refers to SRPs as social
media management solutions (SMMS), a naming convention more in line with marketplace vernacular
and reflective of the broader potential for these tools to add value across the customer life cycle. We
define social media management solutions as:
Solutions that help marketers publish, monitor, and respond to customer posts on social
networks.
SMMS are available as point or suite solutions. Back in 2015, we cautioned marketers against social
suites and encouraged the purchase of best-of-breed point solutions. We still recommend point
solutions.2 Since then, however, we’ve seen enough improvements in suite capabilities to make them
a practical consideration for brands balancing multiple social marketing objectives and for whom
efficiency and collaboration outweigh specific technology requirements.3 Customer references from
this year’s Forrester Wave perceive more buying efficiencies with suite solutions than point solutions
and don’t agree that simply cobbling together different social point solutions guarantees best-of-breed
quality (see Figure 1).
FIGURE 1 Customer References Agree Social Suites Provide More Buying Efficiencies Than Point Solutions
“Please indicate how strongly you agree or disagree with each of the
following statements.”
It’s more effective to buy all our social tools from Buying different social tools from different vendors
the same vendor. is the best way to ensure you get best-of-breed
solutions.
Disagree
11% Agree
21%
Disagree
Neutral 50%
Agree
29% 61% Neutral
29%
Base: 38 social media management solution users

Note: Percentages may not total 100 because of rounding.
Source: Forrester’s Q2 2017 Global Social Media Management Solutions Forrester Wave™ Customer
Reference Phone/Online Survey
© 2017 Forrester Research, Inc. Unauthorized copying or distributing is a violation of copyright law. 2
Citations@forrester.com or +1 866-367-7378
SMMS Technology Responds To Brands’ Expanded Social Needs, Albeit Gradually
Today’s leading SMMS get the publishing, monitoring, and posting job done — 87% of survey
respondents say their SMMS provider delivers the functionality it promised.4 But social marketing
is a fast-changing landscape. Instead of anticipating buyer needs, SMMS gradually react, as
demonstrated by their paced addition of capabilities that support cross-functional tasks such as
campaign management and brand reputation management. SMMS’ latest functional additions address
enterprisewide needs such as:
›› Cross-team consensus through enhanced review and approval capabilities. The growing
complexity of branded social media initiatives requires the contribution of business units outside
of the marketing department. In our survey, customer references reported customer service, PR,
and customer insights teams, among others, serving as active contributors to marketing efforts.5
Some vendors address this complexity with augmented review and approval processes capable of
including external, nonseat holders. One client reference shared that such sophistication addresses
his business objective of faster approver response times while limiting risk.
›› Crisis control through advanced response management. Poorly timed posts or ads during times
of crisis make brands appear tone-deaf to current events, potentially damaging brand reputation
and even stock price.6 When PR, corporate communications, marketing, and others push out
content independently, the option to freeze all disparate social communications through one safety
mechanism gives brands overarching control while they regroup. Lithium’s automated post lock
and pause functionality even lets brands temporarily suspend posts without losing the posts’
valuable content.
›› Inconsistent integration with social advertising capabilities. SMMS and social advertising
have a natural affinity, sharing engagement with consumers within the same channel. And B2C
marketers aren’t slowing down their investment in social advertising. Almost one-third of customer
references are implementing paid-ad buys on Facebook and more than half are expanding their
boosted-post tactics (see Figure 2). But SMMS are slow to integrate full social ad functionality
despite this increased marketer activity. Of the vendors we assessed, only Sprinklr received a
perfect score for its social advertising integration capabilities.
FIGURE 2 Customer References Are Implementing And Expanding Their Use Of Social Advertising
“What are your company’s plans for using the following paid social tactics for
buying ads?”
Not interested/ Planning to Implementing Expanding

no plans implement implementation
Facebook 5% 32% 53%
Instagram 11% 5% 34% 39%
YouTube 29% 13% 26% 21%

3%
Twitter 42% 26% 18%
3%
Snapchat 47% 21% 11%
Base: 38 social media management solution users

Note: Not all responses are shown.
Source: Forrester’s Q2 2017 Global Social Media Management Solutions Forrester Wave™ Customer
Reference Phone/Online Survey
Overlap With Digital Marketing Tools Raises The Bar For SMMS Vendors
Convergence is rampant across the marketing technology (martech) stack.7 SMMS capabilities are
no exception, especially as social marketing becomes less siloed and an integral part of marketing
overall. SMMS are adding capabilities already well represented in digital marketing stacks such as
measurement and content marketing, while established marketing technologies are adding SMMS
capabilities. Buyers risk paying for duplication that fragments data, complicates integration, and
hampers collaboration. Caveat emptor: Choose an SMMS that complements your existing technology
stack and proactively supports an expanding ecosystem, especially in areas such as:
›› Measurement and reporting. Brands need to measure beyond content metrics and impressions.8
Today’s marketer must validate social’s contribution to the business by demonstrating impact
on revenue and brand health.9 Customer references cited analytics and reporting as challenges
in phone interviews; in our survey, customer references gave their vendors’ measurement
and reporting capabilities an average rating of 5.08 on our 7-point scale, showing room for
improvement for this critical capability.
›› Integrations. SMMS technologies should integrate with a marketer’s existing technology stack
to drive greater value. For example, integration with a client’s CRM enables a more complete
customer profile, improving future customer experiences in all channels. Yet even when integrations
are available, they require heavy lifting from the client. One customer reference shared that his IT
group must be involved from a “maintenance and management perspective.” SMMS vendors have
an opportunity to not only provide out-of-the-box integrations for existing technologies, but also to
develop processes that ease the effort and friction for clients.10
›› Security/risk certifications. Expect international security and privacy certifications to become

mandatory requirements of brands’ technology partners in the near future as privacy and risk
laws become more stringent.11 These certifications keep providers compliant with evolving global
regulations. SMMS vendors can’t rely on their hosting partners to meet these requirements on their
behalf, as they are ultimately responsible for any data breaches. Salesforce was the only vendor to
meet all our security criteria.
Social Media Management Solution Evaluation Overview

To assess the state of the social media management market and see how the vendors stack up against
each other, Forrester evaluated the strengths and weaknesses of top social media management
solution vendors. After examining past research, user needs assessments, and vendor and expert
interviews, we developed a comprehensive set of evaluation criteria. We evaluated vendors against 32
criteria, which we grouped into three high-level buckets:
›› Current offering. We evaluated each solution’s current feature set with a focus on its ability to pull
nonmarketers into the social media management process. Specifically, we looked at whether the
solution’s response, content, and workflow capabilities allow for nonseat holders to review content
and whether they pull in external data sources, such as CRM or business intelligence (BI) tools. We
also analyzed each solution’s social advertising, measurement, and data partnerships, and factored
in usability, platform security, global functionality, and overall customer satisfaction.
›› Strategy. Similar to the current offering criteria, we evaluated each vendor’s strategy for expanding
social use cases beyond marketing. For planned enhancements, we looked specifically for road
maps that focused on expanding social media beyond marketing teams and sought partnership
ecosystems that include nonsocial measurement and data partnerships. We also evaluated
vendors’ customer retention efforts, pricing transparency, revenue growth, and clarity of their target
markets.
›› Market presence. This group of criteria focuses on the size of each vendor. We looked at each
vendor’s install base, revenue, and customer support.
Evaluated Vendors And Inclusion Criteria
Our evolved 2017 inclusion criteria resulted in the exclusion of some vendors that qualified for our 2015
Forrester Wave of this category. In addition, we excluded Adobe because it is no longer investing in its
standalone social product; it is developing its Experience Cloud to deliver social functionality as part
of a broader offering. Forrester included 10 vendors in this assessment: Facelift, Hootsuite, Lithium
Technologies, Oracle, Percolate, Salesforce, Spredfast, Sprinklr, Sprout Social, and Sysomos. Each of
these vendors has (see Figure 3):
›› A projected revenue for 2017 of at least USD $26 million.
›› A client base that consists of at least 25% B2C companies.
›› A client base that consists of at least 25% enterprise-sized companies (defined as 1,000
employees or more).
FIGURE 3 Evaluated Vendors: Product Information And Selection Criteria
Vendor Product evaluated
Facelift Facelift Cloud
Hootsuite Hootsuite Enterprise
Lithium Technologies Social Media Management
Oracle Social Cloud
Percolate Percolate
Salesforce Social Studio
Spredfast Spredfast Conversations
Sprinklr Sprinklr Experience Cloud 10.4.0
Sprout Social Sprout Social
Sysomos Sysomos 6.5
Vendor inclusion criteria
The vendor has a 2017 projected revenue of at least USD $26 million.
The vendor’s client base consists of at least 25% B2C companies.
The vendor’s client base consists of at least 25% enterprise-sized companies, defined as companies with
1,000 employees or more.
Vendor Profiles
This evaluation of the social media management market is intended to be a starting point only. We
encourage clients to view detailed product evaluations and adapt criteria weightings to fit their
individual needs through the Forrester Wave Excel-based vendor comparison tool (see Figure 4).
FIGURE 4 Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management Solutions, Q2 ’17
Strong
Challengers Contenders Performers Leaders
Strong
Go to Forrester.com
Sprinklr Hootsuite
to download the
Forrester Wave tool for
more detailed product
Lithium Technologies
evaluations, feature
Percolate comparisons, and
customizable rankings.
Sysomos Facelift
Salesforce Spredfast
Current
offering
Sprout Social
Oracle
Market presence
Full vendor participation
Weak Incomplete vendor participation
Weak Strategy Strong
FIGURE 4 Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management Solutions, Q2 ’17 (Cont.)
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Current Offering 50% 3.18 3.97 3.35 3.27 2.73 3.04 4.17 2.23 3.00
Response 5% 3.00 2.00 5.00 2.00 2.00 3.00 3.00 3.00 3.00
Content 10% 2.30 3.70 3.70 3.10 3.10 2.40 3.70 0.90 1.95
Workflow 20% 4.50 4.00 4.00 3.50 3.00 3.50 4.00 1.75 3.00
Social advertising 5% 3.00 3.00 1.00 1.00 3.00 3.00 5.00 0.00 0.00
Measurement and data 20% 3.00 5.00 3.00 3.00 1.00 5.00 5.00 3.00 5.00
Usability 10% 2.00 4.00 3.00 5.00 2.50 4.00 3.50 4.50 3.00
Security and risk 10% 2.50 3.50 4.00 3.00 5.00 2.00 3.50 0.50 0.50
Global functionality 10% 3.00 4.00 2.80 2.10 3.20 1.00 5.00 0.40 5.00
Customer satisfaction 10% 4.00 4.00 3.00 5.00 3.00 1.00 4.00 5.00 2.00
Strategy 50% 3.60 4.35 4.15 2.40 2.70 4.40 3.25 1.55 3.00
Planned enhancements 40% 3.00 5.00 3.00 1.00 3.00 5.00 3.00 1.00 3.00
Partnerships 40% 4.00 4.00 5.00 3.00 2.00 4.00 4.00 1.00 3.00
Customer retention 5% 3.00 2.00 4.00 5.00 5.00 5.00 4.00 5.00 5.00
Pricing transparency 5% 5.00 5.00 5.00 3.00 3.00 5.00 0.00 5.00 1.00
Revenue growth 5% 3.00 3.00 5.00 3.00 1.00 1.00 5.00 5.00 1.00
Target market 5% 5.00 5.00 5.00 5.00 5.00 5.00 0.00 0.00 5.00
Market Presence 0% 2.95 3.45 2.65 3.40 3.95 4.00 4.45 2.85 2.75
Installed base 50% 3.90 2.90 2.80 2.80 3.90 3.50 3.90 2.20 3.00
Revenue 25% 1.00 5.00 3.00 3.00 5.00 5.00 5.00 2.00 1.00
Customer support 25% 3.00 3.00 2.00 5.00 3.00 4.00 5.00 5.00 4.00
All scores are based on a scale of 0 (weak) to 5 (strong).
Leaders
›› Hootsuite’s revamped capabilities officially cement its enterprise status. Legacy player
Hootsuite maintains valued partner status with customers due to its liberal integration philosophy
and client responsiveness. It has enhanced its offering with progressive measurement and
advertising capabilities previously unavailable. While these new additions are individually valuable,
Hootsuite must migrate its measurement and advertising user interfaces into refined end-to-
end experiences to anticipate marketers’ evolving needs. Hootsuite Enterprise’s collaboration,
compliance, archiving, and integration capabilities make it an appropriate product for brands
expanding their use of social beyond marketing teams.
›› Lithium Technologies offers a response-driven SMMS reminiscent of its heritage. Lithium’s

year-old SMMS is reflective of the vendor’s community- and customer-support roots, as
demonstrated by its strong response management and suggested response capabilities. To fully
develop social media into a core communication vehicle, Lithium must support the next level
of core SMMS capabilities, such as collaboration, and include regional social networks without
complicating the user experience. Lithium’s SMMS is best for brands prioritizing response to
customer interactions across social.
›› Spredfast aims to bring marketing and servicing together for “brand love.” Spredfast’s
Conversations product delivers traditional SMMS functionality plus access to add-on features to
unify service and marketing for greater brand affinity. Though clients remain loyal to Spredfast, they
see opportunities for improvement. Some clients want direct integrations into specific digital asset
managers (DAMs). Spredfast does proactively suggest using services such as Zapier to connect
APIs, but this solution is at an additional cost to the client. Conversations is well suited for brands
wanting better collaboration across marketing and service teams.
›› Sprinklr’s advertising capabilities extend its social marketing reach. Sprinklr’s advertising
integration lets clients stay within Sprinklr even as they boost posts, create dark posts, or set
targeting and budget parameters. Plus, Sprinklr offers solid measurement capabilities. However,
Sprinklr’s lack of pricing transparency is an area of concern — clients express apprehension
about Sprinklr’s obscure pricing and unexpected additional fees. Sprinklr’s SMMS is best for large
enterprise social deployments or organizations that already leverage its listening capability.
Strong Performers
›› Facelift’s flexible, workflow-driven approach fuels cross-team initiatives. Facelift, a German

newcomer, doesn’t view social media as an isolated channel. Rather, it enables the distribution of
social’s impact across the enterprise with a rigorous yet safe approach to workflow and approvals.
However, Facelift has an opportunity to deliver more value for global enterprises. It must prioritize
regional network coverage, language accessibility, mobile app support, and partnership expansion
to remain competitive globally. Facelift is best suited for European-based brands or divisions
seeking operational efficiency.
›› Sysomos reimagines its SMMS with a focus on listening and search. In 2015, social listening
provider Sysomos acquired Expion, a standalone SMMS, and GazeMetrix, an image recognition
product. Sysomos has transformed itself into a social suite with extensive language, tagging,
analysis, and measurement capabilities. Yet clients that we spoke with struggle to unlock the full
value of this broader platform, saying it’s not streamlined and some functionality feels disjointed.
Sysomos must better unify its diverse components with a user-friendly interface featuring value-
added technology integrations and collaborations. Sysomos suits clients with global language,
analysis, and listening needs.
›› Percolate excels with content governance, but misses some SMMS needs. Percolate focuses
attention on three content-centric principles: visibility, coordination, and governance. Percolate
has an intuitive interface garnering good scores across usability, content integration, tagging,
and compliance categories. Percolate must continue investing in areas that are of increasing
importance to digital marketers. For example, response management is core to a brand’s social
presence, but this remains an area of opportunity as Percolate doesn’t support automated post
lock and pause functionality. Percolate is best suited for brands that prioritize content creation and
collaboration.
›› Salesforce updates its user experience, yet usability remains an opportunity. Salesforce has
taken its Social Studio SMMS several steps forward since 2015 with a solution that tackles user
experience. Clients noticed significant user interface updates within this past year. Social Studio
does well with tagging and regional social network coverage, but challenges remain with Social
Studio’s cost for integrating across the Salesforce ecosystem. For example, the Salesforce Wave
Analytics Cloud provides robust data and measurement at an additional cost. Social Studio is best
for brands planning to invest or already invested in the Salesforce ecosystem.
Contenders
›› Oracle shines with language support, but must invest in fresh automated capabilities.
Oracle addresses client needs with its global interface available in 36 languages. Though it is
a nonparticipating vendor in this evaluation, it is currently improving its overall user experience
with a user interface upgrade across all its products. Oracle must create efficiencies and provide
additional value for marketers by investing in automated capabilities such as suggested responses
and content recommendations that leverage customer data from other parts of its ecosystem.
Oracle is best suited for clients already invested in the Oracle ecosystem.
›› Sprout Social delivers on customer satisfaction, but not complex client needs. Sprout Social
offers table stakes SMMS functionality at a reasonable price with high usability and customer
satisfaction. Core capabilities include suggested response and scheduling functions. But Sprout
Social will hinder its ability to serve clients across markets if it doesn’t evolve — for example, global
enterprises seeking to reach customers on networks such as China’s Sina Weibo or Russia’s VK
will quickly hit limitations with Sprout Social’s small global footprint. Sprout Social best supports
US-based clients with publishing and customer care needs.
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Supplemental Material
Online Resource
The online version of Figure 4 is an Excel-based vendor comparison tool that provides detailed product
evaluations and customizable rankings.
Survey Methodology
Forrester’s Q2 2017 Global Social Media Management Solutions Forrester Wave™ Customer
Reference Phone/Online Survey was fielded to 63 customer references provided from the vendors
evaluated in the Forrester Wave.
Forrester fielded the survey from March 14 to April 11, 2017. Respondent incentives included a
courtesy copy of the Forrester Wave report. Exact sample sizes are provided in this report on a
question-by-question basis.
This survey used a self-selected group of respondents and is therefore not random. This data is not
guaranteed to be representative of the population, and, unless otherwise noted, statistical data is
intended to be used for descriptive and not inferential purposes. While nonrandom, the survey is still a
valuable tool for understanding where users are today and where the industry is headed.
Data Sources Used In This Forrester Wave
Forrester used a combination of three data sources to assess the strengths and weaknesses of each
solution. We evaluated the vendors participating in this Forrester Wave, in part, using materials that
they provided to us by March 6, 2017.
›› Vendor surveys. Forrester surveyed vendors on their capabilities as they relate to the evaluation
criteria. Once we analyzed the completed vendor surveys, we conducted in-person briefings to
gather details of vendor qualifications.
›› Product demos. We asked vendors to conduct demonstrations of their products’ functionality. We

used findings from these product demos to validate details of each vendor’s product capabilities.
›› Customer reference calls and survey. To validate product and vendor qualifications, Forrester
also conducted reference calls with three of each vendor’s current customers, and fielded a survey
on customer satisfaction to an additional two to six references per vendor.
The Forrester Wave Methodology
We conduct primary research to develop a list of vendors that meet our criteria for evaluation in this
market. From that initial pool of vendors, we narrow our final list. We choose these vendors based on:
1) product fit; 2) customer success; and 3) Forrester client demand. We eliminate vendors that have
limited customer references and products that don’t fit the scope of our evaluation.
After examining past research, user need assessments, and vendor and expert interviews, we develop
the initial evaluation criteria. To evaluate the vendors and their products against our set of criteria,
we gather details of product qualifications through a combination of lab evaluations, questionnaires,
demos, and/or discussions with client references. We send evaluations to the vendors for their review,
and we adjust the evaluations to provide the most accurate view of vendor offerings and strategies.
We set default weightings to reflect our analysis of the needs of large user companies — and/or
other scenarios as outlined in the Forrester Wave evaluation — and then score the vendors based
on a clearly defined scale. We intend these default weightings to serve only as a starting point and
encourage readers to adapt the weightings to fit their individual needs through the Excel-based tool.
The final scores generate the graphical depiction of the market based on current offering, strategy, and
market presence. Forrester intends to update vendor evaluations regularly as product capabilities and
vendor strategies evolve. For more information on the methodology that every Forrester Wave follows,
go to http://www.forrester.com/marketing/policies/forrester-wave-methodology.html.
Integrity Policy
We conduct all our research, including Forrester Wave evaluations, in accordance with our Integrity
Policy. For more information, go to http://www.forrester.com/marketing/policies/integrity-policy.html.
Endnotes
Forrester believes social media can provide brands with value that goes beyond the marketing team. See the Forrester
1
report “You Don’t Need A ‘Social Marketing’ Strategy.”
Best-of-breed point solutions complement core marketing technology capabilities. See the Forrester report
2
“Complement Your EMSS With Best-Of-Breed Point Solutions.”
See the Forrester report “Vendor Landscape: Social Marketing Technology.”

3
Source: Forrester’s Q2 2017 Global Social Media Management Solutions Forrester Wave™ Customer Reference
4
Phone/Online Survey.
5
In 1975, intangible assets such as brand health and customer experience accounted for approximately 17% of the
6
S&P 500’s market value; today, that percentage has risen to more than 87%. Companies must manage their actions
across mediums, including social media, to protect brand health and their bottom line. See the Forrester report “Brand
Resilience: Understanding Risk Managers’ Key Role In Protecting Company Reputation.”
See the Forrester report “A More Perfect Union: Adtech And Martech Convergence Will Revolutionize Marketing.”
7
See the Forrester report “Measure Marketing Engagement Right Or Not At All.”
8
See the Forrester report “How To Measure Social Programs.”

9
10
11
See the Forrester report “Assess Your Data Privacy Practices With The Forrester Privacy And GDPR Maturity Model.”
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The Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management

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Why Read This Report Key Takeaways

Measurement, Integration, And Security

The Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management Solutions,

by Erna Alfred Liousas and Jessica Liu

Table Of Contents Related Research Documents

SMMS Technology Responds To Brands’ How To Measure Social Programs

5 Social Media Management Solution

Evaluated Vendors And Inclusion Criteria

Forrester Research, Inc., 60 Acorn Park Drive, Cambridge, MA 02140 USA

Brands’ Demands For SMMS Mature, Expanding Use Cases

Base: 38 social media management solution users

SMMS Technology Responds To Brands’ Expanded Social Needs, Albeit Gradually

Not interested/ Planning to Implementing Expanding

Facebook 5% 32% 53%

Instagram 11% 5% 34% 39%

YouTube 29% 13% 26% 21%

Base: 38 social media management solution users

›› Security/risk certifications. Expect international security and privacy certifications to become

Social Media Management Solution Evaluation Overview

Evaluated Vendors And Inclusion Criteria

›› A projected revenue for 2017 of at least USD $26 million.

›› A client base that consists of at least 25% B2C companies.

FIGURE 3 Evaluated Vendors: Product Information And Selection Criteria

Vendor Product evaluated

Facelift Facelift Cloud

Hootsuite Hootsuite Enterprise

Lithium Technologies Social Media Management

Oracle Social Cloud

Salesforce Social Studio

Spredfast Spredfast Conversations

Sprinklr Sprinklr Experience Cloud 10.4.0

Sprout Social Sprout Social

Sysomos Sysomos 6.5

Vendor inclusion criteria

The vendor’s client base consists of at least 25% B2C companies.

FIGURE 4 Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management Solutions, Q2 ’17

Full vendor participation

Weak Incomplete vendor participation

Weak Strategy Strong

FIGURE 4 Forrester Wave™: Social Media Management Solutions, Q2 ’17 (Cont.)

All scores are based on a scale of 0 (weak) to 5 (strong).

›› Lithium Technologies offers a response-driven SMMS reminiscent of its heritage. Lithium’s

›› Facelift’s flexible, workflow-driven approach fuels cross-team initiatives. Facelift, a German

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Data Sources Used In This Forrester Wave

›› Product demos. We asked vendors to conduct demonstrations of their products’ functionality. We

The Forrester Wave Methodology

report “You Don’t Need A ‘Social Marketing’ Strategy.”

“Complement Your EMSS With Best-Of-Breed Point Solutions.”

See the Forrester report “Vendor Landscape: Social Marketing Technology.”

See the Forrester report “How To Measure Social Programs.”

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